Escrito por angrymetalguy.com :
It’s been a minute since I danced with a Rogga project. The man of a million bands is ever industrious and cranks out material like Doc Grier churns profanity in the AMG Slack channels. Megascavenger is one of Rogga’s countless projects, side quests, and diversions. Surprise, surprise, it’s Swedeath, and along with the HM-2 buzz and fuzz, there are a fuck ton of Rogga’s friends, contemporaries, and well-wishers included in the bone broth. We last covered Megascavenger on 2014s At the Plateaus of Leng, which was an enjoyable slab of Roggacore. Since then, the project dropped 3 full-lengths which we slept on, because no one can keep up with the Roggalanche. Now we get to 6th album, Toxic Noxious Undeath, where Rogga is joined by no less than 10 guest croakers of various levels of renown. The style is vintage d-beaty Swedeath, and the effort to stretch that well-trod style is nonexistent because Rogga cares not for progress. Can olde dawgs still provide tasty tricks using predictable tropes?
Surprisingly, yes. While Toxic Noxious Undeath is stock standard Swedeath on paper, Rogga and friends inject enough radioactive half-life into the material to make it an entertainingly brainless batch of grave biscuits and morgue dumplings. The gore party kicks off well with the urgent stomp of “Graveyard Screams and Boneyard Dreams,” where death metal legend Kam Lee (Death, Massacre) sallies forth with his nasty roars and monster noises to support a thrashing, bashing bit of fun with riffs for days. It’s the kind of Swedeath song Entombed or Dismember could have birthed in the early 90s, so the nostalgia factor is strong. What follows is a surprisingly spry collection of death nuggets. “Corpses Below” went in one ear and onto my gym playlist in the blink of an eye as Felix from Crematory powers a weirdly beefy, brawny but melancholic little ditty right into your memory hole. Before you know what hit you, you’re in the third movement, and “Exploding Casket Syndrome” is being guided by Erik Rundqvist of Vomitory. It’s a short and sharp deathster and instantly likeable. It could also fit on the average Vomitory release.
The unrelenting pace of the material is a big plus, with one burner transitioning into another. “Heading for the Furnace” is a bleak, nihilistic cut with a doomy vibe that works well without actually slowing things down much. While the ever-changing vocalists are noticeable, they don’t actually disrupt the album’s flow or make things feel scattershot. Some frontmen stand out more than others, but all do yeoman’s work. Dave Ingram of Benediction delivers the lumber on “A World of Fire and Brimstone,” and Michael H. Andersen of Thorium brings a crazed black metal energy to “Fleshburner Yearer.” Are some cuts more stock and generic than others? Sure. “As Purgatory Descends” is solid and punchy but feels like I’ve heard it somewhere a million times before, and closer, “The Morbid Rides Again” is big, beefy, and brainless, but kind of rudimentary. These are minor hiccups that don’t disrupt the flow or the fun in a meaningful way. With the album coming in at a wafer-thin 33 minutes and the songs all kept in the 2-3 minute window, Toxic Noxious Undeath is designed to hit hard, beat ass, and flee with your lunch money, and it accomplishes this.
What can be said about a Rogga project? The man handles all the guitar work, and he’s an expert at slapping the listener around with sturdy Swedeath riffs and harmonies. His playing elevates songs like the title track by injecting memorable hooks and ear-catching little change-ups. While not every project of his has a long shelf-life, he can drop successful albums, and this does enough things right to be one of them. The riffs come fast and furious, and the songwriting is good enough to fend off Swedeath fatigue. There’s a raw energy coursing through the album, and Rogga’s playing is the source. The murderer’s row handling voKills add texture and dynamism to the material without knocking things off the rails. It’s a successful, if not world-shaking, combination.
Toxic Noxious Undeath is a good enough example of what Megascavenger is up to these days to make me want to check out the albums I missed since 2014. If you want a 33-minute dose of classic Swedeath goonery delivered by a rogue’s gallery of death vets, you could do much worse than this. Rogga can still deliver the nasty goods when the stars align. Looks like it’s your lucky day.
Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Xtreme Music
Website: facebook.com/megascavenger
Releases Worldwide: August 14th, 2026
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